My Experience with ATT Internet Air

VPN
1

I have been testing ATT Internet Air for 3 days now. This will likely replace my old ATT VSDL connection. My VDSL connection was was 25 down and 2 up. It served as my backup internet connection for Charter Spectrum which I will keep. So far ATT Internet Air has met or exceeded my expectations.

I have to start by saying that ATT wants you to download the Smart Home App to complete the setup of the All-FI hub. I couldn’t get it to work. The app isn’t needed though. You can just let the device boot up and connect to its Wi-Fi via the information on the back. Navigate to 192.168.1.254 to view the broadband status and change settings.

Speaking of settings…those familiar with the ATT uverse gateways will feel right at home with the All-Fi hub. The settings site has the same look and feel and most of the same options.

Here are some FAQs that may help others.

Can I disable wifi? – Yes. Just go to the wifi settings page.

Can I enable IP passthrough if I want to use my own router? – Yes. Go to the Firewall | IP Passthrough page and select Passthrough as the allocation mode and then use DHCPS-fixed and select the MAC address of your router in the device list.

Can I see the which cell site I’m connected to? – Yes. It will also show RSRP, RSRQ, and SINR.

Will I get an IPv6 address? – Yes. Just make sure DHCP and DHCP-PD is enabled in the Home Network | IPv6 page.

Is the service utilizing CGNAT? – No. I’m getting a public IPv4 address in the space 99.166.x.x.

Will I get an open NAT on my XBOX? – Yes. Assuming you have port forwarding setup correctly on the router behind the ATT All-Fi gateway and you have IP Passthrough mode enabled you’ll get an open NAT. I’m assuming UPnP works if directly connected to the All-Fi hub, but I haven’t tested it.

What can I expect for ping times? – I’m getting about 35ms to various public DNS servers. I believe this is actually a hair better than my ping times on the uverse VDSL service. It is, however, 2-3x slower than my Charter service. Edit: 6 months in I’m now seeing pings closers to 60 ms.

Can I expect a good gaming experience? – Yes. According to my son he was seeing acceptable results in online play. It may not be as good as cable, but definitely good enough.

What can I expect for bandwidth? – I’m getting about 50/30 mbps down/up. This is with an RSRP of -100 to -95, RSRQ of -12, and SINR of 20 to 30 on band 2 of 4G LTE. I am 1.25 km from the tower. The antenna in the All-Fi hub is pretty good. The signal is significantly better than with my cell phone on the same cell and band. In fact, my phone usually can’t even connect to band 2 because the RSRP is too low.

Can I expect a stable IPv4 address? – I don’t know yet. Edit: No. It changes.

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35 ms is going to be the norm until 5G Standalone / 5G SA rolls out. Hardware is capable. Network rollout is under way.

That will get it down to 15-25 ms, depending on location.

IPv4 is under Strict / CGNAT. Some video game services will work through a bypass AT&T custom built.

3

I have been trying it for the past two weeks. It is O.K. Latency is higher than T-Mobile’s internet at my location. Almost double for idle (35-50ms for TMo, 140-180ms for AT&T. It also loses DNS service every couple days (E403 on the display) A restart reconnects and resolves but it is annoying. I am going to cancel the service as my needs are being met with T-Mobile’s service at half the price of AT&T (I have TMO cell service). But, I see the product being no worse than TMO or Verizon 5G home internet service. So, try it, it may work well for your needs.

4

I don’t think I’m NAT’d. If I am then it is a very smart and very fast NAT. I have 3 different ports forwarded (1 for each of the 2 xboxes we have and 1 for my OpenVPN server) and they are all working.

I will say that IP geolocation services do not appear to be working since they say I’m in Redmon, Washington which is no where close to where I actually live. I can see that causing problems with video streaming services. So far so good on YouTube TV though.

5

At&t Internet Air is garbage and I just cancelled it.

6

So be careful and this is bull crap . If you have existing cell phone service and NEVER HAD INTERNET BEFORE WITH AT&T you will get $35 A MONTH after 2 billing cycles . IF YOU HAD INTERNET ANYTIME PRIOR YOU WILL NOT GET THE DISCOUNT . I just got off the phone with 2 ppl telling them I’m waiting for my discount. Both said because I had Internet before I don’t qualify . I said I want to see fine print where it says this . Lady on the phone said you won’t see print , if you called we would have offered you the discount if your eligible and if your weren’t we wouldn’t have told you about the discount . I’m quitting this service . Unbelievable! BEWARE!

7

I had Internet Air for two weeks. When we updated our phones the salesperson at the ATT store assured us that Int. Air was speedier in all respects. Not true. Service was spotty. It took me 7 hours (not a typo) to upload a 4 GB file to Vimeo. That’s when I canceled and went back to the router I had previously. We’re on the top floor of our building and the equipment was optimally placed. I think the personal hot spot on my phone/laptop is as reliable, or more so, as Internet Air.

8

I live in Hayward, CA near Castro Valley and there are lots of cell towers here. When I called and told customer service that it sucked and I wanted a refund, they told me that I had to move it all over the house to see if another WINDOW works. I was told it must direct south to work right. I could not get better receiption in my windows. I do not recommend this cell tower internet service with any of the compaines. There is another company currently making fun of these cell tower services and the scenario is a man is at home with his family. He just used heavy tools to punch holes into his house walls so he can have a clear approach from the gizmo to the tower. The family was “elated” that their speed picked up. LOL! I watched this as I was calling customer service! Sucks to be us with Air.

9

shit sucks… i live in a decent sized area but by no means a big city. my ping for games is rancid. if you only use internet for tv//streaming its probably okay good download/upload. The thing i hate is for gaming it changes your location a lot since there is no set location. So somedays i may have the best ping on a server in Georgia (i live near michigan) while the next day itll be texas, ect…

10

DO NOT USE AT&T AIR IF YOU WORK FROM HOME AND HAVE TO HAVE 1 IP ADDRESS. My work CRM requires me to be on one set IP address to access our system, and with the AT&T air the IP address automatically changed every 24 hours and I was not able to work, they are saying there is no possibility of getting a static IP address so we are SOL. We have cancelled AT&T air and are going back to the normal uverse, along with having to wait another week for updated equipment to be sent to us, and new installation charges. I am out of work (and I am commission based employee) and there is nothing they are able/willing to do.

11

I too can order Air now. I have 100/20 VDSL2 (can get cable but the cable co prices here suck and have caps).

I’m thinking about it because AT&T built a new 5G tower ~800 feet from my house. My phone shows a SNR of ~20-25 in the debug menu on my Note 20 Ultra.

Speed tests on my Note 20 Ultra always come out at ~400-500 Mbps down 90-100 Mbps up.

Pretty much sure I’m gonna order and do the 7 day trial thing where I can just leave my 100/20 VDSL2 on and just send the Air equipment back if I don’t like it.

Very curious about the geolocation stuff. Seen many posts of people saying they are having issues with cert streaming services.

You said your YT TV has been fine and that’s what we have.

Very curious to see how it works out. If I get 400+ Mbps and things work fine that would be great. AT&T has contractors starting to do work to upgrade our street from VDSL2 to FTTH but it’s still at least a few months out. And since this is no contract that doesn’t really matter.

Also just to be clear the Air gateway dose have port forwarding?

12

HOW are you guys reaching going times of ≤50ms like Jesus, I’m lucky to score double digits at all on speed test websites. Across all of them. I usually get 110-300ms ping times… My download speed fluctuates just as much too. 120mbps down to 320mbps down. Upload is capped at 20-25mbps, no biggie really works for me, but the ping, it’s making rip my hair out y’all. Idk what to do. I know how to navigate the settings if a router but idk what all the acronyms mean nor what most settings do outside of IP passthrough and port forwarding stuff.

13

I just got att air and it is shit for gaming. It says I have better speeds when I test it, but I he a ton of lag!!! :unamused_face:

14

Does the Internet Air “hub” allow you to use your preferred DNS servers? I want to use OpenDNS as I currently am.

15

How do you honestly get below 40ms? I’m averaging around 90ms, makes it nearly impossible to play games

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99.166.0.00/16 is a public range, that’s not CG-NAT.

17

So it is CGNAT? So far all I have heard is that there is no CGNAT however your IP address does change frequently or after a power cycle.

18

I just rebooted the All-Fi hub. I got a new IPv4 address. This time it geolocates to the metro area that I live in. There is still no indication that I’m behind a NAT.

With the new IP address my pings to various public DNS servers is about 50 ms.

19

same. horrific service.

20

Damn and i just got it. Shouldve did research beforehand looks like Ill be packing it up waited a week for nothing.